Twins On Her Doorstep. Alison Roberts

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СКАЧАТЬ hair were so strong? Sophie could feel the sharp teeth of her own grief against her heart, getting ready to bite with a force she hadn’t had to deal with for years. Her mother shouldn’t have to cope with this as well—it was just so unfair.

      But Judy seemed to be coping better than she was herself. She looked up at the two people who were staring at each other over her head and then she pushed herself to her feet. She was still pale, but seemed quite steady as she turned to Finn.

      ‘You know what? I’m thinking you’ve had a long drive, haven’t you?’

      Finn nodded slowly. ‘We’ve come from Wexford, in Ireland. Took the earliest ferry.’

      ‘You must be very tired.’ Judy’s tone held the kind of sympathy that made her patients comfortable to follow any advice she might have to offer. ‘And those little girls are probably exhausted.’

      She walked towards the twins. Sophie found herself holding her breath. Her mother was the quintessential maternal figure—more than a little overweight, a bit rumpled, with a smile so genuine nobody could resist smiling back—and babies and children adored her.

      How would these subdued little girls respond? Could they actually be aware, at some subconscious level, that there was such a strong genetic link?

      ‘You’re Ellie, aren’t you?’ Judy was smiling. ‘No…you’re Emma. I’m right, yes?’

      The twins nodded. They couldn’t possibly be aware of any link, Sophie thought, but there was no mistaking that they were falling under Judy Greene’s spell.

      ‘Would you like to come with me?’ she asked. ‘I’m thinking that you’re probably very hungry. Am I right?’

      Her query earned another nod. Slightly more enthusiastic this time, and Sophie heard what sounded like a defeated sigh escape from Finn.

      ‘Let’s put your hoods up. It’s raining outside but we don’t have far to go.’ Judy had a twin holding each of her hands as she came back towards where Finn and Sophie were still standing.

      ‘If it’s all right with you,’ she said to Finn, ‘I’m going to take the girls to the house and give them something to eat.’

      Finn seemed to be falling under her spell as well. He just nodded.

      ‘You two need to talk,’ Judy added.

      ‘But…what about Dad?’ Sophie caught her mother’s gaze. Her father had already given them a health scare. Wasn’t it a risk to add this shocking development to an already tough day?

      ‘He’s fine,’ Judy said. ‘All he needed was some food and a rest.’

      ‘But…’ Desperately, Sophie tried to grasp some element of control in an impossible situation. It might be better if her father didn’t see these children. ‘He might guess. Like you did…’

      ‘We can hardly keep it a secret, Sophie.’ Her mother’s gaze was steady. ‘It’s already too late for that. Talk to—’ Her eyebrows rose as she turned her head.

      ‘Finn,’ he supplied. ‘Finn Connelly.’

      ‘Talk to Finn.’ Judy nodded. ‘And then you can come and talk to me and Dad.’

      The twins seemed happy to follow her towards the back door of the clinic. Judy paused as she opened it.

      ‘And make that poor lad a cup of tea, Sophie. He looks done in.’

      The mechanics of making a cup of tea in the tiny kitchenette of the clinic were helpful. The actions of filling the electric jug and pushing the button to make it work, opening a cupboard to take out mugs, opening the old toffee tin to find some teabags—was a curiously normal bubble in the aftermath of the explosion.

      Had her mother known that it would make Sophie feel a little calmer?

      ‘Do you take milk?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Sugar.’

      ‘Yes, please. Two.’

      Sophie poured boiling water into the mugs and then paused to wait for them to steep. She didn’t turn to where she knew Finn was leaning against the wall.

      ‘You can’t have done it legally.’

      His hesitation said it all. ‘Not exactly, no…’

      She turned to hand him a mug and then waited for him to lift his gaze again.

      ‘So who broke the law?’

      His gaze shuttered. ‘I’m not saying. I will say that she’s a friend of mine and…and she was persuaded by the circumstances.’

      Sophie sipped at her own drink but she was eyeing Finn over the rim of her mug. Yeah…with those looks and that Irish brogue, she had no doubt that he could turn on the charm and persuade women to do whatever he wanted them to.

      Well…she wasn’t one of those women, even if she had been drawn to give him a lingering second glance when she’d first laid eyes on him.

      ‘You want a biscuit?’

      ‘No, thanks. I’m not hungry. Could we…ah…sit down somewhere for a moment?’

      Sophie would have been quite happy to have this conversation standing up. It wasn’t as if it was going to be a cosy chat, was it? But her mother had been right in saying that this uninvited guest looked done in. Well-honed instincts suggested that he might even be unwell given that it wasn’t warm enough in here to have provoked what looked like a faint sheen of sweat on his forehead. She’d had more than enough people threatening to collapse on her today already.

      ‘Fine…come with me.’

      The chairs in her consulting room were still as she’d positioned them to talk to Shirley. Side by side instead of one in front and one behind the desk. Briefly, Sophie considered dragging her chair to make the desk a kind of protective barrier but the unexpected gesture of Finn waiting for her to be seated first made it a step too far. Or maybe it was the hint of a crooked smile—as if he knew exactly how she might be feeling and he was offering an apology.

      She did, however, shuffle the chair further away from the one he took. There was definitely no need to be within hand-holding distance this time.

      ‘So…’ Sophie put her mug down on top of a medical journal she hadn’t had time to open yet. ‘What kind of circumstances were enough to persuade this friend of yours to break the law?’

      Finn had both his hands wrapped around the mug because it was providing a source of warmth that his body was currently craving.

      He hadn’t felt this cold since…oh, no…not since he’d picked up that dose of malaria when he’d backpacked through Thailand on his way to Australia. Now the lack of appetite and his headache could be attributed to more than the stress he was dealing with. This could be yet another problem but, right now, there was a bigger issue to address. A whole heap bigger.

      ‘Ten years or so ago,’ he told СКАЧАТЬ